It is a very small cuckoo, being only 13 to 18 cm (5.1 to 7.1 in) in length, and parasitises chiefly dome-shaped nests of various Gerygone species, having a range that largely corresponds with the distribution of that genus.

The shining bronze cuckoo was formally described in 1788 by the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae.

[2] Gmelin based his description on the Shining cuckoo from New Zealand that had been described and illustrated in 1782 by the English ornithologist John Latham in his A General Synopsis of Birds.

[3] The shining bronze cuckoo is now placed together with 7 other species in the genus Chalcites that was introduced in 1830 by the French naturalist René Lesson.

[4] The genus name combines the Ancient Greek χρυσος khrusos meaning "gold" with κοκκυξ kokkux "cuckoo".

[5] In 1801 Latham described the "Glossy cuckoo" as Cuculus plagosus from New South Wales,[6][7] and the two were classified as separate species for many years.

[14] The grey warbler is a common host species in New Zealand, the shining bronze cuckoos missing the first but parasitising heavily the second broods of the season (55% of nests in a study in Kaikōura).

[19] Insectivorous, the shining bronze cuckoo eats insects that are avoided by other birds, such as caterpillars, particularly those of the magpie moth, and beetles, particularly ladybirds.